Why Do We Feel Homesick?

As we grow, we naturally create attachments to things specifically available to that environment. Homesickness happens when we are displaced from a familiar environment and are forced disconnected from what we are used to. This causes anxiety and emotional distress.

It can be a challenge to adjust to a new environment, culture, language, social networks, etc. The initial culture shock and lack of control over what happens around you can cause confusion, loneliness, and anxiety. Our fight-or-flight alarm system can also trigger the body to respond in various ways.

Homesickness Symptoms

The consequences of homesickness can manifest as mild to severe symptoms. There is a potentially incapacitating impact on physical, cognitive, and psychological functioning, which can affect anyone no matter what culture, race, age, and context.

Here are some of the typical symptoms caused by homesickness:

1. Physical
   ・Disruption of sleep and appetite
   ・Increased risk of infection and gastrointestinal issues
   ・High arousal which may lead to physical ailments such as headaches or dizziness
   ・Hormonal changes that suppress the immune system
   
2. Cognitive
   ・The pervasive desire to return home and pessimistic views about the new environment impacts the person’s general behavior and psychological functioning
   
3. Psychological
   ・Depression
   ・Loneliness
   ・Anxiety

The symptoms come as a complex mix of psychological, cognitive, and physical, so it can be difficult to fully recognize that being homesick is the cause of reason.

If you are reading this in preparation for making the move, the post below may help you with what to expect when you go through the change.

4 Ways to Cope With Homesickness

The science on homesickness is typically focused on the cause and symptoms, and there aren’t many documented studies on coping strategies. However, research suggests that mental health counseling, social connections, and achieving a sense of belonging in a new environment, are crucial ingredients in overcoming homesickness.

Here are a few coping ideas that could help this process.

1. Explore Your New Home Area

Staying still will give room for the brain to lament all the wonderful memories back home. So, try to get moving and feed your brain with exciting new information. No matter how much you think you’ve already explored your new home area, there is always more to find. Stay open about it with a fresh mind.

Look up places you’ve never been to or wander around and see where you’re drawn to. Even more, bring a camera to see if you can look at things from a different angle. The stimulation you get from traveling is known to relieve stress, and there’s always a way to find new stimulations as if you were a tourist. Try to go out with a fresh perspective and an adventurous mindset so that you can land upon pleasant surprises and new encounters in the area!

It’s time to start finding things that you love about your new home!

2. A Deeper Connection With Existing Relationships

Moving to a new area doesn’t mean you become estranged from your friends and family. In fact, it can make you closer.

Sure, the relationship you had won’t be the same in the way you communicate because there is distance. However, this is a great time to connect deeper with your loved ones.

You can exchange care packages that consist of pictures and local products gathered while you explored. Long heartfelt hand-written letters and quality phone conversations are highly appreciated in this day and age where loose and impersonal connectivity through social media has become the main way we connect.

Take this as an opportunity to form authentic connections with the people you love, but don’t dwell and spend too much time on your relationships back at home. Set a time to bond with your existing relationships, but at the same time, don’t forget to create a new life that’s based on your local reality.

3. Work on Self-Care and Mental Health

The isolation you feel when you move to a new place can be used to your advantage. It’s an excellent opportunity to work on yourself when there is alone time.

Moving to a new place means that you can rewrite expectations of who you want to become. Try to form reflective habits like journaling or meditating every day. If health is your concern, exercise and practice a healthy balanced diet. On the other hand, daily reading is a great way to nurture knowledge and relax. Perhaps this is the opportunity to invest in a skill you want to learn. So, take the time to create habits that shape the life you want to form.

If homesickness is mentally getting to you, this is a great time to exercise habits that help you achieve mental strength.

Science suggests that mental health counseling is also helpful in combating homesickness. If you need someone to walk through the problems with you, an AI (Artificial Intelligence) can help without any restrictions on time, schedule, or location. It’s an affordable alternative counseling method with a free trial period. Give it a try!
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4. Build A Connection With People in Your Area

Social connections help us feel fulfilled in our life. As much as you may miss your connections at home, it is important to work towards building a new social landscape.

Try to actively go out and meet new people in your area. If you’re really homesick, it may help to find others who also miss home or are originally from the same area as you. Volunteering, online social platforms, hobby communities, and educational classes are all great places to meet like-minded people. Getting to know someone takes time, so stay optimistic even if you can’t find someone you connect with right away.

As you meet new people, try to keep a record of all the fun things via photos and journaling. It is important to see the progression of the great memories you build to acknowledge the growth you’re going through.

Good Things Take Time

Don’t get discouraged if you can’t meet the right people or can’t adjust to the new lifestyle right away. We all start somewhere to create an environment that we can call our new home. It takes time to learn and adjust to the new culture, people, food, and ways of things.

Try to enjoy the excitement of feeling like an explorer or a newcomer. This is the time to embrace fresh perspectives and inspirations that flow in as an outsider, and to create a new life that we desire!

Reference:

Ferrara, T. (2020). Understanding Homesickness: A Review of the Literature. Journal for Leadership and Instructions, 8–15. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1255848.pdf


Southwick, N. (2021, June 22). 26 Ways to Reduce Homesickness Abroad. Go Overseas. https://www.gooverseas.com/blog/ways-reduce-homesickness-abroad

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70% of the World’s Population Harbors Trauma

According to an epidemiological survey conducted across 24 countries, the percentage of people who have experienced trauma at least once in their lifetime is 70.4%. That’s how close traumatic experiences are to us. Those who have experienced a traumatic event usually have flashbacks of those memories. Random experiences similar to past contingencies at any moment can lead to negative interpretations and distress.

According to a survey at a Japanese university, more than 90% of the students were aware of the symptoms of trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but had never properly learned or sought treatment for appropriate stress management. Furthermore, while a single instance of trauma can cause PTSD, repeated exposure to trauma can lead to complex PTSD, with more severe manifestations of symptoms. While most of us are exposed to the idea of trauma and PTSD through media (movies, interviews, and books), only a few of us go on to actually study or seek further knowledge on the topic. With the lack of proper understanding, many people suffer from traumatic memories believing that they’re abnormal or blame themselves for it.

Trauma not only affects the individual but those around them too. For example, a thoughtful person might purposefully avoid topics surrounding their friend’s trauma. However, the trauma survivor may uninterntionally misinterpret this avoidant behavior. As a result, the survivor may end up feeling even more isolated. Mishandled interactions with a trauma survivor can only prolong and exacerbate the effects of trauma.

A Common Trauma Flashback; Bullying

There are many potential causes for traumatic stress, such as natural disasters, accidents, violence, or abuse. A very common cause, however, is bullying.

Bullying is a common threatful occurrence among children, students, and even some adults. Continual physical and psychological bullying leaves significant impacts on the body and mind. In many cases, the victim feels that they are being bullied, but the perpetrator perceives it as a harmless joke or clowning around. This perception gap makes it a challenge to combat bullying. The painful experiences through bullying become deeply ingrained in the brain, recalled as flashbacks under certain conditions. Bullying can trigger stress responses that involve PTSD.

Furthermore, flashbacks can happen at a moment’s notice, even if the survivor’s not aware of their past trauma. Negative flashbacks can trigger by witnessing others go through the same painful experience, or encountering a similar situation. The repetition of this occurrence strengthens the fear of the past, causing more pain within the survivor.

Here are some countermeasures to eliminate flashbacks:

・Write down your feelings when a flashback happens.
・Write down the common triggers for your flashbacks.
・Talk to someone you can trust.
・See a therapist.

As a first step, see if you could try to reduce the frequency of flashbacks and spend less time thinking about the trauma. Deliberate stress management in this way is key in overcoming your past trauma.

Avoidance Can Backfire with Traumatic Stress

For those who have been traumatized, one way to cope is by remembering the trauma on purpose, confronting it, and proactively trying to overcome it. This method helps the survivor conquer their past while building healthy defense mechanisms. Some of us may regard forgetting trauma as a sign of success (i.e. a result of self-discipline). This, however, is a dangerous misunderstanding. “Forgetting” trauma is not necessarily the goal, as the survivor may end up blaming themselves if they ever recall the trauma again.

The natural sensitivity of trauma can lead to more serious problems if not handled correctly. We need to listen to the trauma survivor’s words and “lean in” to get through together.

Avoid Trauma, Complex PTSD, and Other Mental Illnesses

Traumatic experiences are so ingrained in the brain and body, that many people remember even when they want to forget. It’s certainly not easy to overcome. However, it is possible to live a life without any influence from the past. We need to educate and promote a compassionate approach towards trauma and flashbacks, as well as promote healthy methods of stress management. If we can prevent the survivors from withdrawing themselves into isolation, support them as a community and close friend, that will help them recover in a safe and secure environment.

The causes of trauma are different for everyone. It’s important to develop a mutual understanding in order to overcome it. All of us need to see the problems caused by trauma as a community issue, rather than an individual. Providing a community is essential for the trauma survivors to regain their normal lives again. Let’s break down the stigma so that we can all contribute towards a more wholesome and compassionate society.

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If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Image：Unsprash
References：
Takii, M., Ueda, J., & Tominaga, Y. (2013). Examination of the Difference of Traumatic Event by the Difference in Posttraumatic Stress Reactions, Physical Symptoms, Depressive Symptoms, and Anxiety Sensitivity. Anxiety Disorder Research, 4(1), 10-19. doi: 10.14389/adr.4.10

Kobayashi, E., & Miwa, S. (2013). Comments on Studies about Bullying : About the Definition and Measures. Ibaraki University Studies in Teaching Strategies, (32), 163-174.

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Actively Making Friends

For students entering a new semester, the psychological stress caused by their environmental change weighs heavily.

Will I make new friends?
Will I find a new romantic relationship?
Can I keep up with my studies?
Where will I go with my future career?

There are many things to mull over.

Japanese students entering their freshman year took a sruvery to answer, which parts of their lives they considered most important throughout their university experience. Students who had a positive attitude towards “socializing and friends” overall maintained healthier minds. Talking to and spending time with friends are crucial activities in maintaining good mental health. The key to finding communities that we can fit into, depends on how socially proactive we are. As for college students starting a new life, you can determine your future by directing your energy towards what you envision.

Post-Retirement Isolation and Loneliness

On the other hand, a lack of community is a problem among adults. Many people don’t have places to interact with friends or acquaintances in their personal time. This often becomes even more noticeable during unemployment, or after retirement. Things can turn difficult when retirees realize that their workplace was the only community they had. Many of them had been incapable of physically or mentally connecting outside their workplace. This is due to the fact that most of them worked from morning to night, then spend the rest of the day recuperating alone at home. It sounds inevitable for such people to feel lonely when they lose their only place of community.

Leaving a job not only means having less income, but also a loss of community. Such inconvenience and isolation from society greatly affect the mentality of an unemployed or retired. This can potentially lead to the onset of depression, and sometimes even suicide. For those who work every day, creating a community outside of the workplace takes up a lot of energy. But joining a community and interacting with others is one of the best preventive measures for loneliness and isolation.

Active Listening is the Key to Communication

What kind of person would you like to befriend? Someone with a good personality, easy to talk to, independent, and respectable. An admirable person meets all these traits along with an indispensable skill; the ability to listen to others.

“Active listening” is a wonderful communicative skill that’s widely promoted by managers across companies. Academically, this means to;
・Empathically understand without judgement
・Provide unconditional positive interest
・Stay open, frank, and genuine

In other words, look at things from the perspective of others, empathetically listen to them without judgement, and be sincere with your responses. Active listening doesn’t require a special technique. It’s actually a realistic and practical approcah in encouraging others to become more aware and open to their surroundings as they prosper.

A questionnaire targeted 124 employees that received mental health training from their supervisors. In response to the question, “What content of the training did you find useful for your workplace in the future?”, 63% answered “active listening.” Respondents believed that it was useful in building relationships, interviewing staff, creating an open work culture, and detecting potential mental health disorders. While ‘listening to others’ sounds like the basis of communication, there are surprisingly many people who lack these basic skills. Active listening is an essential skill if you want to build a community where there’s trust and prosperity.

Enrich Your Life With Active Communication

Although positivity can require considerable amounts of effort, it often leads to better mental health. In order to effectively communicate with people with different values, we continuously need to consider ‘why’ the other person thinks the way they do. Through conscious effort, we can eventually fully embody the spirit of active listening as a natural skill. Proactive communication skills will help us enrich our lives with more fulfilling relationships.

Images: Unsplash
References:
Takahashi, M., Morita, S., Ishizu, K. The Influence of Collectivism and Sense of Community to Mental Health : Through an international comparison between Japan, China and Korea. (2010). Bulletin of the Graduate School of Education,the University of Tokyo, 50, 159-179. Retrieved from https://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/120002924396

Asaoka, S., Igarashi, A. Importance of communication with friends for keeping good mental health in university freshmen (2004).The Japanese Society for the Study of Career Education. 22(2), 11-18. https://doi.org/10.20757/career.22.2_11

Ikegami, K., Tagawa, Y., Mafune, K., Hiro, H., Nagata, S. The Effectiveness of the Mental Health Training including Active Listening for Managers(2008). SANGYO EISEIGAKU ZASSHI. 50(4), 120-127.  https://doi.org/10.1539/sangyoeisei.E7008

Park Yong Koo. Japanese Yonug People’s domestic directivity based on data : comparative analysis between Korea and China.(2016). Journal of East Asian Studies. (14), 251-260. Retrieved from: https://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/120005767107

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